Great Zhou Empress

Su Mingcha took Xue Zhijing to their family's tea garden.

The season is just around the vernal equinox, which is the earliest time to pick bud tea.

Although it is in the south, it is still warm and cold, and there is a hint of coolness when you wake up early.Su Mingcha took Xue Zhijing up the hillside, and followed the tea pickers to pick the earliest batch of tea leaves.

"After a winter, there are very few teas now, but they are also very tender. We are not in a hurry here, after all, they are for the people, but the tribute tea garden must be in full swing."

Su Mingcha's tea-picking movements are very skillful, and it can be seen that he is used to it since he was a child.

Before sunrise, Su Mingcha said, "You must pick tea leaves in the early morning before sunrise. After sunrise, when there is sunlight, the dew will be absorbed into the tea leaves, and the tea leaves will not be fresh enough after picking."

Originally, Xue Zhijing wanted to try picking tea, but when he heard this, he was really afraid of spoiling the fresh and tender tea leaves, so he didn't dare to do it, so he just acted as a shopkeeper beside him.

With a smile on her face, the girl stood among the fresh and green tea trees, pinching off the tenderest buds and leaves with her fingernails, and then carefully put them into the basket. Just looking at this scene makes her feel pleasing to the eye.

There are tens of thousands of tea trees in the Su family's tea garden. Looking at it, the entire hillside belongs to the Su family's tea garden.

Su Mingcha knew that Xue Zhijing was curious, so he picked a basket of tea and wanted to take her to see how to process the tea, Xue Zhijing naturally went there happily.

After entering the tea factory, Su Mingcha said to Xue Zhijing, "Aunt Xue, wait a moment, I need to wash my hands and change my clothes first."

So many rules?

But after Su Mingcha changed his clothes, washed his hands, and wrapped his hair, Xue Zhijing thought, in fact, this can be regarded as the food hygiene management of this era, and cleanliness should be done before making.

The first step is to wash the bud tea and then steam it on the steamer.

Su Mingcha said, "This first step is also a clever job. It must be steamed, but not too ripe. If it is too ripe, the color will turn yellow and the taste will become weak. If it is not cooked, there will be a kind of grass the taste of."

While the tea leaves were steaming, Su Mingcha introduced the next steps to Xue Zhijing.

Afterwards, the steamed tea leaves are pressed repeatedly, and then developed with tools such as earthen pots, as well as the steps of tea making and aging, and finally made into the tea cakes commonly used in this era.

Su Mingcha took Xue Zhijing to look at the previous inventory again.

"These tea cakes can be transported over long distances. Some of our tea is sold to the border market."

Xue Zhijing asked in detail how much tea their tea plantation could produce and where it was sold.

But after asking carefully, she found that Su Mingcha didn't seem to understand the business situation very well, and she didn't know many details.It's like a kid who just took over the family business and doesn't even know the accounts.

Xue Zhijing naturally helped Su Mingcha to sort out this matter, mainly to teach her how to do it.

Su Mingcha is still too young, only 13 years old. She is familiar with everything and is a professional technician.

But now she is not a person who only needs to deal with tea. What she has taken over is an integrated enterprise from tea plantation to sales. She must quickly transform from a professional technician to a manager.

Her mother is still recuperating in Yangzhou, so she can't help at all, so she has to learn and grow up by herself.

A few people from the tribute tea garden came to the tea garden, and Xue Zhijing accompanied Su Mingcha to meet them.

Unexpectedly, they brought a surprising news.

"I told the former patriarch of your Su family that this year all the Sheqian tea from your Su family's tea garden must be given to our tribute tea garden and supplied to the royal family."

Because the earth god is sacrificed, the vernal equinox is also called the spring society.Sheqian tea refers to the freshest, rarest and most precious batch of tea leaves picked before the spring equinox.

Su Mingcha became anxious immediately, "How is it possible, we are going to sell this batch of tea by ourselves."

"The contract is all signed." The other party took out a document with half of the words of the contract on the side seam.

When signing documents in this era, the word "contract" will be written in the middle of the two documents for anti-counterfeiting. If they are taken apart, they will be half of the words of one person. If they are put together, if the words on both sides are combined, it can be proved that they are two identical document.

I went to rummaging through boxes and cabinets again to find out, and sure enough, there was another contract.

"I'm not wrong, you have to make tea quickly, and it will be delivered to Bianjing City during the spring equinox."

It seems that the Su family not only has business problems, but also has some unknown transactions.

If you just want to find out about Chagong Tea Plantation, let’s start here.

Xue Zhijing asked Su Mingcha to make tea first, and she went to find out about the situation.

The Yuanjia cabinet shop came out again, and it happened that they sent the information about the family assets of Chen Jiancai, the tribute tea official, that Xue Zhijing asked for last time.

As expected, there are some huge assets of unknown origin.

Back in Quanzhou, Xue Zhijing immediately went to find Ayila. Unexpectedly, she happened to meet Ayila who was going out to help someone repair a boat, so she said that she would go with Ayila.

Originally, I just wanted to chat about Chen Jiancai on the road, but I didn't expect to see the word Chen engraved in a hidden place on the carriage she was riding in.

"Who are you helping to repair the ship?"

"Chen Jiancai."

Ah!It's a coincidence, okay, let's go and have a look first.

Ayila is also a wonderful person. Riding in the same carriage, Xue Zhijing was silent, and she was also silent. She didn't feel the atmosphere was awkward at all. Instead, she fell asleep by leaning on the cushion. Feel.

I have to say that the same rice feeds all kinds of people.

Arriving at a hidden dock, the person who greeted him was a middle-aged man in a gray robe. Xue Zhijing deliberately dropped half of Ayila's body, and then bent slightly, and his momentum weakened. The man had never seen Xue Zhijing before. She is probably the engineer brought by Ayla, so she didn't ask much.

It is said to be a hidden dock, but it is far away from the crowd and not open to the public. However, the area of ​​the dock is very large, and two sea ships can be seen moored in the bay.

Xue Zhijing pretended to accompany Ayila to repair the ship, but asked the sailors on the ship from time to time where the ship had been, where it was broken, and when will it leave next time.

It is said that in summer, along the monsoon, I will go to Silla and Japan, and then go to Nanyang in winter.

There are a lot of goods to be transported, the bulk of which is tea.

Tea?

Xue Zhijing had vaguely come to a conclusion in his heart, that is, Chen Jiancai, the supervisor of the tribute tea garden, stole the tribute tea and smuggled the tribute tea overseas to sell it overseas, earning huge profits from it.In order to do this, he not only spent his own money to build two sea boats, but also asked Ayla to build another bigger boat.In order to make up for the lack of tribute tea, he went to tea gardens such as Sujia Tea Garden to ask for bud tea with similar quality to tribute tea.

……

The spring snow melted in the Northeast, the royal family of the Liao Dynasty was stationed, and the ice on the Duck River began to loosen.

That night, Xiao Liege was woken up by a loud noise. She put on a fox fur and walked out of the tent.

Many people woke up from the dream like her, and they all watched helplessly as the surface of the river melted, and the river water mixed with ice cubes and rushed into the river.

The roaring river water is mixed with ice platoons one after another, slamming forward and back and rushing downstream. The river is like a child who has been suffocated for a whole winter, releasing his strength between the sky and the earth.The ice row and the ice cubes collided together, rolling wildly like a wild horse.

spring is coming.

Not long after, it will be the biggest festival in spring, goose hunting.

The aristocrats released the sea dongqing that they had found in the eastern forest area, and began to hunt down the geese that appeared in spring, and then they had a roast goose banquet.

At this time, the leaders of various tribes also rushed over from all over the country to meet the new emperor.

How can the cute nephew handle these things, it is Xiao Liege who is acting as the emperor.Khitan aristocratic women have a high status, even if they are not married, they can own their own property and slaves. In the past, there were cases where empress dowagers or empresses acted as emperors, so no one doubted Xiao Liege's role as a princess regent.

After the banquet, Xiao Liege specially recruited Yelu Hongyi, a mature and prudent member of the Yelu family, to have a chat.

As we talked, we talked about Yelu Hongyi's daughter.

"The emperor has also reached the age when it's time to get married. I have seen your love before. She is at the prime of life. I think it is just right to be a queen."

In fact, it was too early for her elder nephew to get married, and the other party's daughter was a little older than her elder nephew at the age of 15, but it didn't matter if she got engaged earlier, not to mention that now the arrow was on the string and she had to make it.

The direct descendant of the Yelu family wanted to kill her, and she didn't know when they would do it next time, so she had to act first.But with her current strength, it is still a bit difficult for her to directly confront the Yelu family.

Xiao Liege doesn't have much experience in strategy, but she is very experienced in hunting, and she knows the principle of "dividing, wooing, and besieging".Although there are differences in intelligence between prey and humans, the truth is the same when viewed from a distance.

Yelu's family is huge, and the power of the royal family can't do it head-on, so let's divide them first, and then win over some of them, and the rest can be suppressed and solved.

Win over the mature and prudent Yelu Hongyi, and strengthen their relationship with each other through marriage,

This is a descendant family, the Yelu family is very big, and there are many girls, and there is actually a lot of competition among them who should be the queen.When Xiao Liege mentioned it at this time, Yelu Hongyi naturally would not disagree.

People are selfish. It is better for a daughter to be a queen and to be the head of the country than to follow others in the clan to pursue a dynasty change that may not be successful. Yelu Hongyi was separated from the Yelu family by Xiao Liege. A big chunk of Yelu's house.

The two sides agreed, and the matter would naturally be easy to handle. Xiao Liege even granted Yelu Hongyi an official position.In this way, Yelu Hongyi's status in the Yelu family will be improved, and he will be able to attract more members from within the Yelu family, further dividing the power of the direct line.

At the same time, Xiao Liege rewarded many tribes in the name of the new emperor's enthronement.

These tribes have some new fiefs interspersed around the Yelu family's fiefs, forming a mutual restraint situation.

The next step is to prepare for the battle against the Dacheng Dynasty.

At that time, let the tribe of Yelu's family be the vanguard to consume their strength. At the same time, no matter where they can reach the Dacheng Dynasty, this is also the first grand battle of his regency, and it is all military exploits.At that time, no one would dare to challenge her authority.

In just half a year, Xiao Liege had changed from a fire princess who only knew how to act impulsively to a newly promoted regent who carefully used tactics.